C. Yang (Linsey) MSc

Stance-taking—the expression of our subjective certainty, attitude, or evaluation—often relies on a wide range of linguistic markers such as "I’m sure…" or “I’m glad…". This can be challenging for L2 English speakers in dynamic spoken interactions. Do L2 English speakers from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds express subjectivity to varying degrees? Do they differ in their use of stance markers—from epistemic to attitudinal? And how do they adapt to different L2 spoken tasks?

My research addresses these questions by systematically comparing spoken corpora from Chinese, Dutch, French, and Greek L2 English speakers, as well as L1 speakers of British English. I am interested in how their use of stance marker reflects deeper cross-linguistic and cross-cultural influences, and how stance maker usage relates to the realisation of speaker subjectivity.